twenty-6
Copyright Shane Rynhart 2013
Cover image by Flickr user Keoni Cabral
https://www.flickr.com/photos/keoni101/5526749781/
Image used under a Creative Commons Attribution license https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/deed.en
* * * * *
Dedication
For Ella. You’d never have read these, but I hope you’d have been proud. I miss you every day.
* * * * *
Contents
(Note: click any * * * * * between stories to return to this contents page.)
Introduction
Part 1 - One Man’s Quest to Find God
A Warning
Two Come Along at Once
Fides
The Ice Cream Man
The Third Message
Ones and Zeroes
Face in the Crowd
Defender of the Faith
Twenty-Six
Shattered
Part 2 - From Darkness
The Eyes
RPS
The Egg
Cold Bones
Sandman
Destiny
Part 3 - Into Light
Bubbles
Rainbow
The Waiting Room
Subversion
Part 4 - A Heap of Broken Images
Icarus
Tomahawk
Free
There’s More than One of Everything
Deep Blue
Jam
Appendices
About the Author
Contact
???
* * * * *
Introduction
Hiya. My name’s Shane Rynhart, and every week I upload a story to my website, https://plasticcastlemagic.tumblr.com. I’ve now done twenty-six. Twenty-six! That’s…quite a lot! I’ve surprised myself with my own dedication to the project. It’s pretty crazy.
You may have noticed that this eBook is called twenty-6. I WONDER WHY?!
Yeah, it’s just a collection of all of the stories I’ve written this year. Well, not all of them. I’ve started and stopped so many in pursuit of this ‘one story a week’ dream. These are just the twenty-six that was happiest with at the time and thus uploaded every week. I will admit that I cheated a little on a couple of fallow weeks, and posted stories I’d previously written or self-published. Most, however, were written on the week of their publication. Generally speaking I wrote a first draft on a Monday and reworked and revised them until Friday came a knockin’.
I’m proud of the vast majority of them. I’d be lying if I said that every single one was perfect. In fact, there are one or two that I kind of dislike. But these are a very small minority and, I mean, everyone who enjoys being creative will have the occasional quality blip, right?
Anyway. You can catch a new story every Friday at midnight UK time, unless something disastrous happens (in which case there will be an explanation). I hope that you enjoy these stories enough to come and visit every week or, even better, follow my Tumblr. (You can also ‘like’ my page on Facebook to get notified every time there’s a new upload.)
Rather than just presenting the stories in the order I wrote them, I’ve mixed things up a bit. Many of the stories exist in the same fictional universe, so I’ve decided to keep them together. Also, they are presented here for the first time in chronological order - I purposefully kept things rather ‘jumpy’ as I was writing them. You’ll read these first - under the in-my-head-it-makes-sense heading of One Man’s Quest to Find God - followed by a collection of others in an order that I hope is pleasurable to read.
If you have any feedback - positive or otherwise - I’d absolutely love to hear it. There’s a list of contact methods towards the end of this eBook, and it would be wonderful if you used them. I’d love to hear from you.
Thank you so much for downloading this eBook. I’m incredibly grateful for your support. I do hope you enjoy it.
-- Shane Rynhart
* * * * *
Part 1 - One Man’s Quest to Find God
A Warning
[message received 23:00 UTC 2013-04-04]
[title: ]
[from: ]
[message begins]
Hail Mary, full of grace.
God is in the radio.
He’s also on the TV, the internet, and in our minds. God is everywhere, and God can’t be trusted.
It was about 150 years ago. July 2015. A man proclaimed himself as God. Everyone brushed him aside, at first, claimed he was a madman. Rightly, you’d think. Problem is: he was. Or is. Will be, for you.
God had shown himself, but rather than bringing judgement - as most religions had predicted - he came to rule without judgement. People could carry on as is. As long as they knew he was their leader.
Any dissent to this simple ideal was - and remains - punishable by death.
Traditional religions vanished. There were mass suicides. No one religion had ever been right, it seemed, and that created a frenzy. But after that frenzy came realisation. If this man really was God, he had to be trusted. He’d created us all, after all. Our Father. Of sorts.
Over time, God’s strength got greater and greater. He could control weather. Impress himself on our consciousness. The weirdest thing is that he appears differently to everyone. To me, for example, he is a black man with dreadlocks and a scar on his cheek. To my brother, he is white, with short blonde hair and Caribbean Sea-blue eyes. The look is consistently different.
He also walks with a limp. Some people - quietly - think that this is put on. After all, God moves in mysterious ways. It seems too…perfect.
I’m writing this because…he needs to be stopped. Someone has to stop God from gaining so much power. It’s impossible to stop him now. There is no way of getting to him, let alone removing him from the equation. Even now, I have to move quickly. As soon as he realises I’m creating this message, he’s going to kill me. This is my last action with my last few heartbeats and I’m on the verge of tears. But I needed to do something. If this is to be my legacy…I hope at least that it will be worth it.
I could do so much with time travel. I’ve been working on it for my entire professional life. But I know I am not strong enough to carry out this task. I pray - huh - that you are. God is alive in your time. In the shadows. He walks among you. Stop him. There must be a way. If it bleeds, you can kill it.
I’m sending it back to a couple of years before he arrived. It’s the best I can do. I hope it’s enough time. Look in London-That-Was. He’ll be there. Please. It’s…probably too late for us, but you can still save your world.
God isn’t in the radio yet. Maybe he never will be.
KD
Pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
[message ends]
* * * * *
Two Come Along At Once
Lucas popped into existence on the top floor of the 5A bus. There was no record of him before then, but he had plenty of time afterwards.
Nobody saw this guy appear out of thin air. He was sitting right at the back, on an otherwise empty bench seat, and only ten other passengers were on this deck. There was no noise, no fading, no bells. Simply, he was not there, and then he was.
After staring out the window to get his bearings - it didn’t help - Lucas decided to walk downstairs. There had to be a reason he’d been brought here, after all, and there weren’t any clues staring him in the face.
The lower deck was much busier than upstairs, rammed in fact, mostly with pensioners. There was only one seat free, about halfway along the aisle, next to a girl who was ten years his junior. A student. Long brown hair. Short. Slightly too much make-up. A bag filled with files and folders on her lap.
It was hi
s mother.
Lucas really couldn’t believe it was her. His mum. Not just young but…alive. For the first time in twenty years, Lucas was looking at the woman who’d given him life. She was so beautiful. He’d only seen photographs of her at this age, but they were no match for the reality.
He desperately wanted to go and introduce himself - hell, to give her a big hug and tell her he was sorry - but it wouldn’t have been a good idea. “Oh hi, I’m your son from the future,” probably wouldn’t go down so well. He decided to sit next to her, though. He figured that wouldn’t do any harm.
It was funny. She was wearing the same perfume that he always caught whiffs of as a boy. He hated it in those days, but now it smelt like sunshine, picnics, parties, holidays. The memories crashed over him so quickly he couldn’t quite think straight.
Of course, she wouldn’t know this. He estimated from looking at her - casual sideways glances, not an I’m-a-crazy-person stare - that this was around five years before his birth. And she never once changed her perfume.
While Lucas’ mind played out the day his parents had rented a canal boat on the River Stour - one of the last good days - he noticed an old lady at the front stand and press a button on the nearby handrail. A bell chimed. A few seconds later, the bus pulled over with a hiss of air, like an angry cat. The doors slid open, and the old lady stepped off gingerly, directing a cursory ‘thanks’ at the driver.
A young man got on flashed a pass into the cabin. Blonde hair. Geek glasses. Checked shirt. Tie. Messenger bag on his shoulder.
It was his father.
Lucas gasped. His mum noticed and looked at him. He knew what she was thinking - Why do I always sit next to the weirdos? His dad, meanwhile, took the old lady’s seat at the front. He looked at his watch, anxious about something.
Then Lucas remembered a story. A story he’d been told so many times as a little boy. Perhaps even aboard that boat on the River Stour.
“Your mum and I met on a bus,” his dad said. “I was late for an interview. I desperately wanted that job, and the bus would just not come. It was heaving when it arrived, only two seats. Next to an old man or next to a beautiful young lady. Easiest decision I’ve ever made. We got chatting, me and her, so much that I missed my stop. Never did get the job, but I got something much more important. The rest is history, I suppose!”
Except it wasn’t.
Because now that had never happened. And would never happen.
Lucas mentally smacked himself for being such an idiot. If he hadn’t sat next to his mother, if he’d stayed upstairs, none of this would have happened. He didn’t want to think about the ramifications. He had to get his parents to meet, right now, on this bus.
Lucas bided his time. There was nothing he could do immediately. But he had a plan. A risky one, but better than nothing. While he waited, he tried to hold onto the memories. They were harder to find, now. More like a fiction than a past reality. But the perfume helped. The perfume was his torch in the fog.
A few stops later, Lucas’ dad got up from his seat and pressed the button. He drummed his fingers on the handrail. Lucas got ready to pounce. Now or never.
The second the bus pulled to the kerb, he stood and grabbed his mum’s bag from her lap. She shouted, of course. Pulled. But Lucas wretched it away. She went to chase after him. All the other passengers just sat there and looked on. Either too old to stop the robber, or just past caring.
Lucas purposefully ran into his dad and dropped the bag, then jumped off the bus. The doors shut behind him and the vehicle pulled away. As it did, he saw his parents talking. She was smiling. Thankful to the stranger who’d stopped a thief. He didn’t look in the least bit concerned that he’d missed his stop. All was as it should be.
As the bus drove into the distance, another memory came back to Lucas. The last time he’d seen his parents. Staring out the back of a horse box, with tears in his eyes. They were kneeling on the road. Soldiers pointed rifles at their heads. As the box pulled away, he saw his parents try to fight their captors, to get their son back. The soldiers didn’t even flinch as they fired on them. Three shots each. Blood on the tarmac.
Dead.
Lucas was hit by a reality. He’d just made his parents meet each other, sure, and had guaranteed the sanctity of the timeline, but he’d also sentenced them to death in sixteen years. Maybe they’d have lived longer without him. Maybe they’d have been better off never meeting.
Maybe Lucas did a bad thing.
The consequences rolled around his head until he popped out of existence once again.
* * * * *
Fides
She felt like she could hit him. “I can’t believe you think that!”
“Oh yeah, because it’s not as logical as a man who walked on water, magically fed thousands of people and then turned into a zombie.”
“Jesus wasn’t a zombie. He died for our sins and was resurrec…uh…but that doesn’t make him a zombie!”
The man drew most the air from the room into his lungs, a mating ritual for some species, but he simply wanted to prepare himself for further communication. However, he changed his mind, and merely sighed instead. He stood up from his chair and headed for the kitchen sink. “Don’t you dare walk away from me!” she said.
“From this grand theological debate for the ages? I’m not going anywhere. I just want a drink.”
The woman stood up now, much more quickly than he had. She scooted in his general direction and blocked the way to his intended source of refreshment. “No. We do this. Right. Now.” Her voice was hard as granite. His face gained a look of confusion and fear, giving him the qualities of a deer caught in a hunter’s headlights.
“Jeez. OK. Christ, I can’t even remember why we were talking about this.”
“A-ha! You used two Christian epithets just then. Christianity is part of the English vernacular. It’s important.”
“Right, first, I don’t think ‘epithet’ is the right word. But, like, I can’t think of the right word at the moment, so I’m not going to correct you. Secondly: who cares? Language itself is secular, removed of God; any religious meaning is implied.”
“All meaning is implied. That makes no difference. ‘Christ’ refers to the Lord Jesus Christ, nothing else. When people say Christ, they are referring to Him, even if they’re atheist.”
“And what does that prove? Just because I mentioned Him-with-a-capital-h doesn’t mean I have to believe in Him-with-a-capital-h. Seriously, what is the point in this conversation?”
“You brought it up.”
“I did not! All I said was…” He found himself cursed with a lack of words.
She filled in the blanks for him, suitably lowering her voice as she did. “All you said was that you don’t want to marry me because you aren’t Christian.”
“No. No, I did not say that. What I said is that I don’t want to marry you in a church because I’m not Christian.”
A beat. “Then…”
“Yes. My answer is yes.”
The corners of her mouth practically reached her eyes as her teeth bared her happiness for the world to see. She wrapped her lanky arms around him in a bear hug, and nearly pushed him into the cabinet with the force. “Woah,” he said, “Calm down!”
She released him, suddenly serious again. “I’m getting married in a church,” she said, in that hard tone again.
“No, look, we’ve been…” he spotted a look on his now-fiancé’s face, the scariest expression he had ever seen. This was the second time in a matter of minutes, and he expected he would see it many many more times in the coming years. This situation was not negotiable. He sighed. “OK. Fine. But that doesn’t make me a Christian.”
Her face relaxed, and she smiled that sweet smile that made him fall for her in the first place. “My love for you is stronger than for any zombie,” she said.
“That is kind of stupid, you have to admit.”
“No more stupid than believing that the monotony o
f daily life is all there is and we have no hope of a life beyond death. Faith and hope is why I’m religious. Not burning bushes and the magical cloning of sardines.” He had to concede that she had a point.
“So uh, can I get that drink now?” he said. “I’m kind of thirsty.”
She moved out of the way of the sink, and positioned her arms in a be-my-guest manner. He picked up a glass from the draining board and began to run the tap into it. And…
“That…is not water,” she said.
Sure enough, a thin burgundy liquid was flowing into the glass, not crystal clear H2O. The man held the glass there in shock, and allowed the wine to dribble onto his hand and down the drain. He looked at the woman, unsure of himself.
“This changes nothing.”
* * * * *
The Ice Cream Man
It’s a wonderful day. I could say a perfect day, but that would be a bit presumptuous. Everyone has their own idea of perfect, after all.
Regardless, after a long, hard, winter, spring has finally sprung, and left an impression on just about everyone. From my vantage point, I see a lot. Crowds of people milling around the promenade, looking for a place to pitch their towels. Kids paddling in the sea, making the most of the hot air/cold water contrast. Families on a Ferris wheel at the end of the pier, cheeks bright red from smiles and too much UV. And an ice cream van, right next to the beach, with a line as long as a piece of string winding from it. The man within smiles sweetly as he hands the kiddiewinks their lollies.
It’s not the right time.
I spy a group of lads - the sort of lad you’d ordinarily find spilling out of godawful nightclubs at 3am - playing with a novelty flying disc on the sand. Every now and then, a ‘fit bird’ catches an eye. As this happens, the starer gets hit with the plastic plate. There’s a roar of laughter. That’s what it looks like, anyway.
Another child in the line. Not yet.
There isn’t a cloud up there in that gorgeous blue sky. It’s like a particularly well-ironed bed sheet. There are a few birds, though. Seagulls. I’ve never noticed, actually. Do seagulls come out when it’s raining? I can’t say I’ve spent enough time at the beach to notice.